power of ten. The reason given for this is that it is often difficult to obtain accurate
population figures (because, e.g. of the lack of good language questions in many national
censuses), and the difficulty of defining the status of speakers of a language, especially
second language speakers.
The Linguasphere Registry, like the Ethnologue, is presented both as a set of print
volumes and delivered electronically over the Internet. Unlike the Ethnologue, the whole
of the information in the Linguasphere Registry is not viewable for free on the Internet.
The website for the electronic version is split over three domains: www.linguasphere.org,
www.linguasphere.net, and www.linguasphere.com. Each site has somewhat different
information, e.g. the dot-com site has an order form for print and electronic access, while
the dot-org and dot-net sites provide more background information and lack an ordering
mechanism. The dot-org site provides samples from the Register for free download,
which are Adobe PDF format documents. No equivalent to a database front-end is yet
available for this data.
The Linguasphere Register is currently maintained as a project of the
Linguasphere Observatory, and international organization incorporated in Wales, France
and India. It is unclear from the websites whether there has been significant activity in the
organization since late 2004, but a number of projects including those involving the
construction of language maps, are reported to be ongoing as of the last update.
2.3. Other sources of language statistics
Apart from the two sources mentioned above, there are no other sources of language
identification that aim to be comprehensive in their coverage. Hence, there are no other
comprehensive sources of language statistics. All other sources fall into three general
types: (i) general linguistics reference materials covering a variety of languages, (ii)
language group and language family references, (iii) scholarship on endangered
languages. We will not attempt a detailed review of these materials here. Examples of
each of these categories of materials and descriptions of their contents follow.
2.3.1. General linguistics references
Dalby, A. 2004. Dictionary of Languages: The Definitive Reference to More Than 400
Languages. New York: Columbia University Press.
This reference addresses primarily a non-specialist audience, with the intent of
identifying the referents of a selection of language names. There are 400 entries,
focusing primarily on the most populous languages, with some entries for more than
one language (generally these are for language families or groups, whose total
populations are substantial). Population figures are given as round numbers, typically
in the tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands or millions. Entries generally provide
1-2 pp. of encyclopedic material describing the language(s) or speakers of the
language(s), a map, and possibly some linguistic information such as grammatical
forms, examples of peculiar linguistic features, tables of numerals, etc. Entries are
organized alphabetically by language name; there is an index that facilitates access to
the data by country, but alternate names for the languages do not appear to be listed.
There is no bibliography, although some entries do give bibliographic citations, so it
is difficult to identify the sources of the information, their currency or accuracy.
Bright, W, ed. 1992. International Encyclopedia of Linguistics. Oxford: Oxford
University Press. (Second edition, 2003, Frawley, W, ed.).
This is a general reference work primarily intended for specialists and students in
linguistics. Alongside other information of interest to specialists, there are entries for
individual languages and language families. There are 378 such entries in the first
edition (the second edition was not available for examination as of this writing).
Language family entries are followed by lists of languages and their estimated
populations from the Ethnologue (the 11
th
edition is cited in the first edition of the
IEL; 14
th
edition in the second edition of IEL). Language entries typically also give
population figures, though sources for such figures may not be cited.
Comrie, B, ed. 1990. The World’s Major Languages. New York: Facts on File.
This is a general reference work intended for specialists and students in linguistics,
focusing on relevant linguistic and historical description. What counts as a “major
language” is a subjective matter (Preface, p. ix), decided on the basis of such criteria
as number of speakers, official status of the languages within different countries, and
the existence of long literary traditions. The book is organized into 48 chapters of
varying specificity (divided into 12 sections based on language families). Population
figures are often cited, but generally without source information, so the currency and
accuracy of the population figures is uncertain.
Comrie, B; Matthews, S; and Polinsky, M, eds. 1997. The Atlas of Languages. New
York: Facts on File.
This is a general reference intended for the lay-person. It is not so much an atlas as a
series of short articles organized geographically and illustrated with maps. Numbers
of languages are reported for different countries and regions, but the presentation is
more didactic and less systematic than could be desired. There is no bibliography, and
individual articles do not have bibliographic citations.
2.3.2. Language group and language family references
Cambridge Language Surveys: This is a book series published by Cambridge University
Press which publishes volumes addressing specific language families and language areas.
Citations to relevant examples of this series follow. The series consists of sixteen titles
published since at least 1980. Global coverage is extensive, but not yet complete; regions
such as the Americas, Western Europe, East Asia and South Asia are reasonably well-
covered, whereas Africa, Central Asia, Western Asia, Southeast Asia, and Oceania do not
have titles addressing them yet. The volumes vary according to subject matter and author
preference in their organization, some emphasizing linguistic structure and history (e.g.